Thanks, Cartoonstock!

 

"Marcy's making a love Mother's Day Webcast!"

A busy week or two here. First, my thanks to Cartoonstock for featuring a couple of my cartoons on their landing page on Monday. Above is their funny cartoon example for the "computers" section. Here's a better version:

Cartoonstock also used this one for their Children cartoons section:

Here's a better version from Cartoonstock:

In the past week, we've gotten a couple of big snowstorms. Clean up for the one on Saturday that dumped about 16 inches on the previous 6-8" took over an hour. 

At last, the birds were able to be fed. I have an incredible variety here including a bunch of bluebirds. Here's the spread I put out. It's fine dining here, with sunflower seeds, peanuts and fried meal worms.

 

But, still, in general, I'm able to get back and forth to Manchester to teach this semester's History of Illustration course at New England College. 

We were fortunate to get Jim Benton (Happy Bunny, Dear Dumb Diary, Franny K. Stein) join the class for a live Zoom last week. A great guy with some amazing stories! Tomorrow's the Midterm. It's all done, but I need to proof it. 

Yesterday was my last day of kids cartoon classes at the Acton, Maine Public Library. It was a swell time, and while about 8-10 kids were expected, over two dozen -- and their parents -- actually showed up. It was SRO! One of the parents had been following along, drawing with the kids on her phone.

 

 

It was a lot of fun and the kids were great. On the last day, we drew what our families looked like. Here's one of the kid's drawings.

 

The cats are doing well and looked through the windows, giving us their moral support while we shoveled and snowblowed.

Last month it was this blog's 17th anniversary. My thanks to everyone who sent on some contributions via Paypal. These are greatly appreciated. I also received these two books in appreciation. You guys are amazing!

There's more going on as well, but these were the highlights for this time. Thanks as ever for dropping by.

From the Dick Buchanan Files: Gag Cartoons 1944 - 1964

Dick Buchanan has unearthed many a gag cartoon in his Cartoon Clip File located somewhere in Greenwich Village. What did he find this day? Here's Dick with the skinny. Thanks and take it away, Dick!


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GAG CARTOONS
(1944 – 1964)

The Cartoon Clip File recently took a deep dive into a boxful of single panel gag cartoons in search of some desert island cartoons. Actually, instead of a deep dive, we just turned the box upside down and started from there. We found plenty of desert island cartoons alright, but we also found some cartoons we’d long forgotten. Take a look . . .
 

HANK KETCHAM. Collier’s March 18, 1950.

MORT WALKER. Argosy August 1950.

VIRGIL PARTCH. Collier's August 5, 1955

AL ROSS. 1000 Jokes April-June 1963.

 

FRANK O'NEAL. Saturday Evening Post October 1963.

 

LEO GAREL. Liberty February 19 1944.

 

MARK STAMATY. Collier's April 20 1946.

 

GALLAGHER. True Magazine April 1962

 

GARDNER REA. SEP March 13 1954.

 

PHIL INTERLANDI. SEP March 13 1954.

 

BRAD ANDERSON.  The Saturday Evening Post  February 25, 1961.

MORT TEMES. The Saturday Evening Post November 7, 1953.

 KLEINWAKS. True November 1948.

 

 GENE CARR. Liberty January 1 1944.

 

CLYDE LAMB. Boys' Life February 1951.

 THE BERENSTAINS. Collier's April 15 1950.

 

DICK CAVALLI. The Saturday Evening Post November 14, 1953.

 

 MARQUEZ. American Legion April 1953.

 

 

 

 

TON SMITS. Look April 21, 1964

 

DAVE GERARD. Collier’s March 18, 1950. 

Wally (Trog) Fawkes 1924 - 2023

British editorial cartoonist and jazz musician Wally Fawkes, who used the pen name Trog, has died at the age of 98. He died peacefully on Wednesday, March 1st. 

Via The Daily Cartoonist:

Newspaper illustrator, comic strip artist, and political cartoonist Wally Fawkes was also a renowned musician.

From the BBC in 2005 on the occasion of Wally retiring his cartooning career:

"In a society increasingly categorised by lists of the Top 10 Greatests, perhaps one day everyone might be the best in the world at something.

"It will always, however, take something special to be Number One in two quite separate categories.

"Depending who you talk to, Wally Fawkes is either Britain’s greatest living cartoonist or one of its greatest living jazzmen."

 

Via Lambiek:

 

"Wally Fawkes is well known in the United Kingdom for two – as he put it himself – 'minority pursuits': jazz music and cartoons. He was a clarinetist in several British jazz combos, among them Wally Fawkes and the Troglodytes. The latter group also inspired his pseudonym as a cartoonist: "Trog". For 62 years, Fawkes was also active as a political cartoonist. His sharp and left-wing cartoons sometimes went directly against his papers' official ideology. The same could be said about his most well known work, 'Flook' (1949-1985). The adventures of a little boy and his furry animal friend started out as a children's comic, but eventually evolved into something that appealed more to mature readers. Storylines made frequent allusions to current events and both British as well as international politics. In this sense it provided a veritable time capsule of three decades worth of post-war events. 'Flook' is also praised for its extensive portrayal of London. Nearly every street and location has been captured in Fawkes' poetic drawings. Naturally 'Flook' has always remained a British phenomenon, despite efforts to translate it to other countries. While the series is overly reference overdosed, highly dated in some aspects and never made available in its entirety, 'Flook' is nevertheless fondly remembered by many British newspaper readers."

 

From Start to Finish - Making Cartoons with Martin Rowson

Martin Rowson shows us his studio and how he works.

This is from The Lakes International Comic Art Festival 2021 gallery show "What a Fur Cup: An exhibition of the political cartoons and comics of Martin Rowson."

"For nearly 40 years Martin Rowson has been the scourge of the political establishment, focusing his unflinching eye and scurrilous wit on those in power. 

"His cartoons for the Guardian, Daily Mirror, Independent, New Statesman and many more, draw from an encyclopaedic knowledge of western culture and combine with a breath-taking talent for image making. 

"His comics, including The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman and The Communist Manifesto take apparently challenging texts and make them accessible and enlightening for a whole new generation of readers. 

"'What a Fur Cup' will feature some of Rowson’s most powerful political cartoons, caricatures and comics and present an entertaining journey through the past forty years of politics and celebrity."

TEE VEE HUMPHREY A Weekly Reader Book

 

When I was a kid, The Weekly Reader was newsprinty little newsletter we got in our class at Roosevelt Elementary School in Iowa City, IA. This was, as our teacher Mrs. Panje would command, our "silent reading" time; our give-Mrs.-Panje-a-break-time. We would read about world events, do a puzzle, etc. Weekly Reader was dry, but a welcome respite from the routine of second grade.


The Weekly Reader was more than the name of some newsletter. The WR people also pushed books. TEE VEE HUMPHREY, a hardcover children's book that sold for $2.75 in 1957, was one of them.


The cover opens up into a nice gatefold of Tee Vee.

 

A crummy commercial!

Here is the page that lets you know that there were hundreds of bad books that were rejected before those Weekly Reader Board people (bless 'em!) deemed this tome, TEE VEE HUMPHREY, as the best one to put their seal on -- oh, and by the way, why not tell your friends they should join the Weekly Reader Children's Book Club. Why don't they? Do they hate America? This will not look good on their transcript!


I bought this book in 2007 at the Community Bookstore in Brooklyn. This divey, dark used bookstore has a lot of junk and, like those Weekly Reader folks, sometimes you have to go through a lot of garbage before your find a treasure there.


Illustrator Kurt Werth has an inky, casual style that I found appealing. It's almost like I'm looking at his sketchbook. Here is Tee Vee asking for a job at the TV station.

SPOILER ALERT

Tee Vee gets a job at the local TV Station, show running a program about pets. This is back in the day when a kid could just walk into a TV studio and get a job without a union giving him a thumping.

END SPOILER ALERT

 

The sketchiness of the art cloaks Mr. Werth's layout skill. Your eyes are easily drawn to the man at the mike in this one.

Kurt Werth, whose work outside TEE VEE was unknown to me, studied at the State Academy for the Graphic Arts in Leipzig.

"The First World War brought an abrupt end to Werth's studies at the academy when he was drafted into the army in 1915. With sketchbooks in his knapsack, Werth continued drawing throughout the war. Unfortunately, Werth sent his wartime sketchbooks to a girlfriend whom he never saw again, and so the pictorial record of his war years was lost forever." -- from an online bio created by the University of Oregon Libraries

Ugh. I hate it when the girlfriend absconds with a dude's sketchbooks! That's so uncool! Well, Kurt later married an actress, and they stuck together. They moved to the United States in 1939. During WWII, he became a cartoonist for publications like Common Sense, The New Republic, and Harper's.
I hope to find more of his work.

 

And, in the back flyleaf of the cover, is your own, official Weekly Reader bookmark with silhouettes of horses, a viking ship, 2 musketeers kissing (well, that's what it looks like to me), Charlie Chaplin with a balloon holding his pants up, a witch and a spaceship, all suspended on a clown's nose. You also are being asked to take an oath to tell your teacher and friends about this book, you little corporate schill, you! I think this kind of mentality is what made Mr. Werth move from Germany.

-- This originally appeared on my blog on June 7, 2007.

From the Dick Buchanan Files: Unlikely Subjects: Cavemen 1947 - 1964

Dick Buchanan has gone all neanderthal on us, extricating archaeologically silly gag cartoons from the bottom strata of his cartoon clip file, and sharing them with us on our version of the cave wall. (The internet, I mean. Duh.) Dick has all of the hairy, knuckle-dragging, wheel-inventing tropes for you below. Thanks and take it away, Dick!

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UNLIKELY SUBJECTS: CAVEMEN
(1947– 1964)


Some subjects of 20th century gag cartoons were completely inane. For instance, take one of the grand creations ever spawned by comical artists of yore . . . the Caveman, not to mention the Cavewomen and the Cavekids. In the early 20th century Neanderthal Man was usually depicted by illustrators as ape-like. Over time a standard image emerged. Cavemen were portrayed as dim-witted lugs dressed in animal hides, armed with a large club or rock. The club was using for mating. The hairy male used his club to clobber the female before dragging her away, by her hair, to his cave. Some story, eh? We could hardly believe it ourselves. 

Despite the fact that humans and non-avian dinosaurs did not exist at the same time, the pairing was often used for comedic effect. Comic strips like Alley Oop and B.C. are memorable examples of this. The 1960’s television series The Flintstones went one step further, featuring prehistoric mammals as tools, household appliances, vehicles and construction equipment.

Imagine our relief when we sifted through our trove of 20th century gag cartoons and unearthed some shining examples of the caveman genre. Here is the story of prehistoric men and women as imagined by some of the mid-20th century’s leading cartoonists . . .

1. CLAUDE (SMITH) The Saturday Evening Post May 9, 1948.

 

2. VAHAN SHIRVANIAN. 1000 Jokes Magazine December, 1962 – February, 1963.

3. JERRY MARCUS. 1000 Jokes Magazine August – October, 1954.

 

4. JACK TIPPIT. For Laughing Out Loud January-March, 1962.

5. NED HILTON. 1000 Jokes Magazine June – August, 1959.

 

6. VIRGIL PARTCH. Collier’s February 5, 1954.

7. JACK TIPPIT. This Week Magazine November 26, 1961.

 

8. WILLIAM SCULLY. Punch October 28, 1953.

 

9. FRED SUROCE. The Saturday Evening Post March 31, 1962.

 

10. BILL BREWER. Argosy August, 1957.

11. GEORGE HAMILTON GREEN. Collier’s May 27, 1955.

 

12. ORLANDO BUSINO. Boys’ Life August, 1964.

 

13. LEE LORENZ. For Laughing Out Loud 1964.

 

14. GEORGE WOLFE. Collier’s November 12, 1947.

15. WILLIAM O’BRIAN. Look June 30, 1964.